


Cryptids and Conspiracies and Cults, Oh My!

by viktorcerise



Category: Team Fortress 2
Genre: Conspiracy Theories, Cryptozoology, Fist Fights, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-14
Updated: 2015-03-14
Packaged: 2018-03-17 18:54:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3540341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viktorcerise/pseuds/viktorcerise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sniper's an odd duck with an interesting worldview. Engineer doesn't take too kindly to it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cryptids and Conspiracies and Cults, Oh My!

**Author's Note:**

> so my brilliant friend loarfy suggested that Sniper is a major conspiracy theorist and this fic was born

When the Sniper arrived on-base, the Scout actually showed some interest. Not because the man was any different from the other ragtag, scruffy weirdoes he was gonna be working with, but because he had a camper van, and that scored him major cool points. (The Engineer had a pickup, but if Scout so much as breathed near the frickin' thing, the Texan would chase him while waving a wrench.)

It was a big ugly kind of thing, the van. Weird, off-beige colour; dinged up and muddy to the point where the license plate was mostly invisible – and so many bumper stickers on the back it was a wonder Sniper could see out his back window.

“The frick is a 'squatch'?” Scout said.

The Sniper didn't even look up from sharpening a wicked-looking knife. “Short for 'sasquatch', mate.”

“A what?”

“Sasquatch. Also known as 'yeti' or 'Bigfoot', as you Yanks call'im.”

“Huh.” Scout rocked back on his heels and peered at a few more. 'I Brake 4 Jackalopes' was pretty self-explanatory, as was 'My Other Car is a UFO'. “UFO, huh? You ever been picked up by aliens?”

The Sniper looked up. “I have, yeah.”

“You serious? That's like, fricking amazing! Were they like all slimy and crap like that?”

“Naw. They got grey skin with big black eyes and tiny noses.”

“You sure? That don't sound like any aliens I ever heard of.”

“Positive, mate.”

He said it with such intensity that Scout, in a rare show of self-awareness, failed to mention how he was pretty sure that was just the way aliens looked in _Close Encounters of the Third Kind_. 

“What about Bigfoot? You ever seen a Bigfoot?” 

“Only glimpses, and it ain't likely that I'll see one down here in the desert. Best I can hope for is a hoop snake, or if I'm unlucky, a yee-naldlooshii.” 

“A...?” Scout felt himself adrift in a sea of Medic-level weirdness, and that feeling only intensified when the Sniper looked at him with the same kind of suspicion one does tax collectors and dognappers. 

“Yee-naldlooshii,” Sniper pronounced, “are Navajo witches. They say even sayin' the name is bad luck.”

“So why're you sayin' it?”

“I ain't Navajo, so I figure they'll give me a free pass on using the non-English word.” He shrugged and tested the edge of his knife. “You got a reason to be hangin' around here, or did someone make it your job to be nosy?” 

Scout took that as his cue to make tracks. He left the lanky weirdo in the process of setting up a firepit, and jogged back to base  thinking “Why the fuck isn't anyone around here a  _normal_ guy?” 

 

It became apparent, even to the less-normal members of the team, that the Sniper was... _odd_ . There had been an unwritten consensus, before he arrived, that everyone had to at least  _try_ whatever had been cooked for supper that day, no matter who did the cooking. This included when Soldier created some horrifying swill out of canned soups, or when Scout actually attempted to make something other than takeout pizza. 

But Sniper never ate anything he didn't cook himself. Ever. This included coffee, which he drank by the gallon – although when Spy saw him spooning instant coffee mix into his #1 Sniper mug, the snort of derision he let out could've registered on the Richter scale. Since he never ate  _anyone's_ food, nobody could really feel insulted about it, although it was kind of disconcerting how he watched the proceedings at the mess hall. Sure, Spy watched everybody all the time, but at least Spy was pretty open about his intentions to sneer at everybody. Sniper, on the other hand, would watch from under the brim of his hat like he was at an aquarium watching mysterious deep-sea fish. 

Things became a little clearer when he finally commented on something. 

“Probably shouldn't be usin' that stuff, mate,” Sniper said one morning, nodding at Medic's very precise spoonfuls of sweetener. 

“Hmm? I don't believe I follow,” said Medic, and took a sip to ensure he'd reached optimum coffee sweetness. 

“That aspartame shite. It'll give you cancer.” 

Medic sniffed and took a defiant sip of coffee. “Not based on the research I've seen.”

“Yeah? Well, maybe you oughta start  readin' things that ain't published by Big Pharma, mate. Michael J. Fox used to drink Diet Pepsi by the gallon, and look how he's ended up, poor sod.” 

Medic rolled his eyes. “Please. If you are going to pick on someone's habits, you could at least pick on something much more immediately detrimental to the health. Spy, for example.” He gestured towards the Frenchman, who was lighting what had to be his sixth cigarette of the morning while he waited for his espresso to be ready. 

“Do not involve me in your petty disputes, médicin,” said the Frenchman. 

“I was making a point.” Medic looked over at Sniper, who didn't seem to be at all deterred from his crusade. 

“ See, but Spy knows that'll kill'im eventually.  That aspartame, they market it like it's some harmless thing when it really eats you from the inside out.” 

Medic glanced at Spy, who frowned in a way that said 'you're on your own, amigo'. 

Sniper continued, unabated. “I mean, you're the doctor 'round here. You oughta know this stuff if anybody oughter.” 

Medic drained his coffee before replying. “Frankly, Sniper, it is far too early in the morning to be getting into this kind of debate.” Then he turned on his heel and took refuge in the laboratory, where he related the incident to Engineer, who laughed in a kind of 'if I don't I'll probably cry' kind of way. 

 

It kind of came to a head during a Saturday night barbecue. Engineer manned the barbecue itself (and Pyro supervised the fire and all fire-related activities with customary intensity), Demoman brought out an alarming amount of alcohol, and Scout argued with Soldier over what to play over the loudspeakers. Sniper was present, of course, and naturally he wouldn't touch a single thing Engie offered him. That kind of put the Texan into  a bad mood – who in their right mind turns down a beautiful rack of ribs like that?! No wonder the dang boomerang-licker's so thin. 

But, the sun went down and once he pulled out his trusty guitar, his mood lifted a bit. Scout fell asleep after three beers and was dumped on the common room couch by Heavy, and Medic retired early, complaining he'd already taken too much time away from his experiments anyway. That left a pretty decent crowd around the firepit (tended to and watched with rapt attention by the Pyro), and then Soldier produced a bag of marshmallows to share. Engie idly strummed his guitar and looked up at the stars, smiling.

“That there full moon sure is a beaut,” he said.

Pyro hummed in agreement, although they didn't look up from the fire. Engie didn't like the way the silence was kind of closing in, so he continued on just to fill the air.

“Y'know, my grandad went out and bought hisself a colour TV just to watch the landin' back when. I got to stay up real late just to see it.”

“Presumably that's when you decided to become a scientist,” Spy said, though not as acidly as usual – the liquor must've softened his edges a bit.

“You got it, partner.”

Sniper turned his head away from the horizon as Engie cracked open another beer.

“You know that weren't real, right, mate?” he said.

The Texan just about choked on the foam. “What's that, boy?”

“The moon landin'. Didn't happen.”

Demoman gave a grunt of derision, rolling his eye. Engineer set his guitar down carefully.

“I'm not sure I read you proper, Sniper. What's that you said?”

“I said,” said Sniper, “the moon landin'? It was faked, mate.”

Spy took that as his cue to leave. Engie stood up.

“Listen, son,” he said, putting his hands on his hips, “I don't think you know what you're talking about here. I get the distinct impression that you think you know a lot more than you do, stretch.”

“I done my readin'. Stanley Kubrick filmed it and the whole thing was faked on a back lot in Arizona.” Sniper shrugged and swigged his beer. “But, don't let me keep you from believin' in a happy lie, mate.”

“Whoa, there, boy, I wouldn't go wavin' your much lackin' credentials around like that, especially when you are possibly the least qualified man sittin' in this here circle.” Pyro, what with being distinctly enigmatic, was naturally excluded from that particular generalization. “Now, if you wanna talk hard science, I'm happy to school you on the whys and hows of exactly how gat-dang wrong you are on every possible level.”

“Oh yeah, accreditation? You wanna talk accreditation? I don't need a stinkin' piece of piss paper to tell me what I know, egghead – least of all one from one of yer bloody ivory tower universities.”

Now even Pyro was taking notice. Engineer cracked his neck, and Sniper stood up, fairly towering over the Texan.

“I really do think you shoulda oughta take notice of what you're sayin' to me, legs,” Engineer said, “since I'm the man that built the very tech that keeps your bony ass alive instead of bein' plastered all over the walls of the base. Heck, I don't doubt that if I had a million dollars and a free weekend, I could build a slingshot to shoot your crocodile-humpin' carcass up to the moon, where you can see for yerself that Neil Armstrong stood on that there soil and planted the good ol' stars-n-stripes for the good of America. Then you'll asphyxiate and you'll die knowin' that eleven-time doctor Dell Connagher was right and you, son, were wrong.”

“Eleven-time doctor, eh? All that knowledge crammed into that little bitty head, and you can't tell when you been lied to.” Sniper snorted and shook his head. “Maybe you'd better go back to school, mate. And make yourself a bulletproof noggin while you're at it, 'cos I'm pretty sure eleven headshots is what you took today - “

That was _plenty_ for the Engineer. He took a running start and tackled the Sniper so hard the Australian's hat flew off and landed on Pyro's head. 

They crashed to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs, and Engie took the opportunity to smash his fist into Sniper's face. 

“You gat damn fool son of a bitch, you'd best watch who yer talkin' down to -”

“Talk down?! Talkin' down is all I can do to you, you half-baked little cun -”

Sniper kneed Engie right smack in the balls, and the Texan gave a howl of agony and half-collapsed. The Aussie wasn't done yet and promptly flipped their positions, wrapping one long arm around Engie's neck and squeezing. 

“I'll show you how we do it down under, you balding ratbag -”

Then Sniper was hauled up and away by Demoman, and Soldier picked Engineer up like a furious chihuahua. 

“Go  _fuck_ yourself, you fuckin' cityslickin' kiwi-shitter!” Engie roared, writhing in the Soldier's grasp.

“That's enough of that, son,” said Soldier, tightening his grip.

“What is  _wrong_ with you lads?!” Demoman said, and made a noise of disgust as Sniper hocked and spat at Engineer's feet. 

“I'll tell you what's wrong – a bloody doctor of so-called  _hard science_ believin' in faerie tales!” 

“This gat dang wombat-flinger has the  _gall_ to -” 

“ _Halt die Klappe!_ ” 

All three and a half sets of eyes turned. Medic, in his stocking feet and housecoat, cut a frightening enough figure that everyone shut up, and anyone who had been quiet felt a distinct sense of guilt. 

“Some of us,” said Medic, eye twitching very slightly, “are trying to  _sleep_ . Whatever schoolboy fight you've gotten into, it ends  _now._ ” 

Soldier dropped Engie and stood to attention, leaving the Texan sprawled on the ground to recover from his blow to the family jewels. Demo let go of Sniper, who retrieved his hat from Pyro and leaned sullenly against the nearest wall. 

“Now kindly go to bed before I put all of you to sleep  _permanently_ .” 

They scattered like rats. (Except for Pyro, who slept in front of the firepit.) Sniper thought about it the next day and decided that the only thing more frightening than an angry Sasquatch was an angry Medic. 


End file.
